Schoolfor The Work

The School Experience

The School provides a safe, loving, and supportive environment that meets you right where you are without pressure or prejudice. The School for the Work isn’t for learning—it’s for unlearning. You’ll spend nine days questioning the fear-based stories you’ve innocently clung to all your life. While immersed in inquiry, you’ll be free to explore life from an entirely new perspective that waits just beyond your story.

At the School, participants and staff support one another as Byron Katie guides the group through a fascinating inward journey, free from the noise and distraction of everyday life. Often participants discover that the joy and peace found in their breakthroughs is matched and even strengthened by witnessing breakthroughs in others.

Many participants consider these nine days to be the most important days they have ever spent. Insights and realizations continue long after the School has ended. People report that they experience life in a profoundly different way, that for the first time they recognize that the universe is friendly, and that they feel a genuine commitment to doing The Work as a daily practice.

The Curriculum

The curriculum at the School is a living, evolving process, changing with the needs of the participants and on the basis of past students’ experiences. The exercises and activities are designed to mirror Byron Katie’s experience in the year after she woke up to reality in 1986.

You will work on your thoughts and stories about

relationships

addiction

body image

communication

forgiveness

sex and sexuality

gender

fear

The Morning Walk

Each day begins with a morning walk.

After the School

We have an amazing aftercare program to help you make The Work a permanent part of your life. It is free of charge and is available to all participants. This program provides daily practice sessions and our free helpline. Many graduates form independent groups to do The Work in their communities or by phone. Chat groups for School graduates are also popular. The School is a continually extended welcome. For those graduates who wish to include The Work in their occupation or to make it their occupation, the Institute for The Work of Byron Katie offers a Certification Program.

Continuing Education Units

Licensed professionals such as marriage and family therapists, social workers, nurses, teachers, alcohol and drug-abuse counselors, and acupuncturists can receive continuing education credit for attending the School.

50 CEUs / CE contact hours are available for licensed professionals. Byron Katie International is currently approved as a provider of CEUs for the School for The Work by these organizations.

Yes, and children who are under 18 must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian. Anyone who can answer the four questions can benefit from the School. No one is too young or too old to have their feelings hurt, to be confused, or frustrated, or depressed, and everyone deserves to know how to deal with their own suffering. Katie does recommend that each participant read Loving What Is before coming to the School.

Two words: Byron Katie. She will be sitting with you through all nine days, facilitating The Work, answering your questions, and sharing her awareness. A competent, dedicated staff works with Katie to make your School the most powerful experience possible.

In another sense, you will be your own teacher, giving yourself the understanding that only you can provide. Katie and her staff are there to support you at every step along the way. And every classmate you work with will be your teacher, and you will be theirs.

The day begins at 7 a.m. The group gathers for a breakfast, and morning meditation, which is followed by an opportunity to share your insights. The schedule for the rest of the day is morning session, lunch, afternoon session, dinner, and evening session (for those who want more).

Katie’s curriculum is very rich and thorough, and it is her heart’s desire that everyone get what they came for: their own freedom. So expect long hours, and all exercises and sessions are optional—this is made clear every day. With very rare exceptions, participants find that they just can’t get enough of the curriculum, it is so fabulous (according to them). The long hours are Katie’s response to their requests, and never something Katie is imposing on them.

Katie’s first School lasted for twenty-eight days, and people found it difficult to get away from their jobs and life for such a long time. Later, by request, she reduced the School to fourteen days. Still later, because so many people who wanted to attend the School said that they could afford only a week away from their families, she reduced the fourteen days to nine, including the weekend before and after. Katie gives people the most that she can possibly give in such a short time.

Great! You’ll enjoy three meals a day in a large dining room, choosing from a wide variety of dishes. The majority of our food selections are vegetarian, and often vegan. Organic ingredients are used whenever possible, and individual dietary requests can be accommodated if we know them ahead of time and if they are doctor-prescribed. Breakfasts include eggs or a similarly hearty main dish. Also, we serve one or more hot cereals, several types of fresh and dried fruit selections, and nondairy as well as dairy milks. Lunches and dinners feature at least two main dishes, a plentiful array of salads, and numerous side dishes of vegetables, legumes, and grains.

This is Katie’s way of supporting participants in staying focused on what they came for—their own freedom, rather than their email—for nine days. It is not a requirement: it is a suggestion. It is important to Katie that participants are offered the opportunity to stay focused on their own process of inquiry, and not be distracted by business or non-emergency family matters for nine days. (Any emergency messages from family or business get to participants immediately through the hotel phones in their own rooms.)

No. Some people do choose to have single rooms. It is suggested that participants have roommates, and that they room with someone they don’t know, because we have found that an unfamiliar roommate often stirs up stressful thoughts, and this gives people a chance to do The Work on thoughts that they have been suffering from their whole lives. The roommate exercises have transformed relationships with spouses, parents, children, business partners, and friends. Our experience is that by the end of the nine-day School everyone who had a roommate is very happy that they did. And often those who chose not to have a roommate feel that if given the opportunity again, they would say yes.

We have an amazing aftercare program to help you make The Work a permanent part of your life. It is free of charge and is available to whoever chooses to enroll in it. This program provides daily-practice sessions and our free helpline. Many graduates form independent groups to do The Work in their communities or by phone. Chat groups for School graduates are also popular. The School is a continually extended welcome. For those graduates who wish to include The Work in their occupation, or to make it their occupation, the Institute for The Work of Byron Katie offers a Certification Program. For more information click here.

Licensed professionals such as marriage and family therapists, clinical social workers, alcohol and drug-abuse counselors, nurses, teachers, massage therapists, and acupuncturists can receive continuing education credit for attending the School.

That’s up to you. The one thing that can be said with complete confidence is that, if your mind is open to inquiry, the School will change your life, and always in a positive way. The great majority of our graduates find their mental, and even physical, well-being enhanced. Their ability to manage stress is markedly improved. They become better listeners, better communicators, better friends, better family members. They become more creative in the face of life’s changes. They may find themselves responding calmly to situations that used to upset them. And the longer they keep doing The Work, the more that kind of realization will become a familiar experience.

I love that The Work is always free on my website. Everything you need to do The Work is there, as well as in my books, which are in as many libraries, school systems, prisons, and nonprofit organizations as we can afford to place them in. There is also a free Helpline on the website.

As for the price, it has not increased in more than a dozen years. I originally looked at all comparable seminars and workshops, and set the price for the School slightly below the median price. By now, the School is considerably underpriced. You can easily check this by searching for other nine-day workshops. If I didn’t think that the School’s value was far more than the price of tuition, I wouldn’t offer it.

To pay for the events, the venues need deposits that are very large, and the balance paid, whether or not the event takes place, and paid in full after the event even if the event must be cancelled for some reason and we still must give participants back their money. So I love that registrations show me whether to do the events or not. They guide me. Any time anyone registers for an event, it tells me their intention, and I love meeting that. It’s my life.

There is nothing like the School on the planet. It is pure, it is radical, and I love that everyone who can take the time and afford to do it has the opportunity to know that it exists. And many who can’t afford it are given financial aid; there are many scholarships and grants to teachers, therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, and others who do hospital, public schools and universities, prison, government, rehab, literacy work, etc. These people and institutions don’t always have the funds to allocate because their budgets are stretched to the point of bare essentials just to continue operating. The scholarships are not loans: they are gifts, with no strings attached. People do not pay them back. And there is a separate financial assistance program available to those who qualify. Some people find this extremely helpful. They pay back $10 a month or $100 a month, and they are consistently grateful for it. With very few exceptions, they don’t take on the obligation to repay the money unless they think they can keep their promise.

The money earned from the School allows me to pay for my website, my large office staff, my airfare and hotel expenses, bring staff with me, and support them, pay for their food, lodging in hotels, etc. (staff who can afford it buy their own airfare and pay their own expenses). The School venues cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, the airfare is expensive, and then I pay staff to hold registration all year, I pay for the office staff, accountants, taxes, insurance, employee health insurance, and the list runs on and on. And in this way the School is made possible.

Everything I have is in the four questions and turnarounds. When people go to my website, instructions for The Work are available front and center. That way, no one has to pay for anything. And if they have the time, the money, and the desire to attend the School, then their money supports not only the School, but our continued efforts to move The Work in the world.

The School for The Work: Testimonials from Past Participants

Just returned from Byron Katie’s nine-day School for The Work. Two words: Do it. But only if you want to permanently end all your suffering. I’m serious.

Martha Beck, author and life coach

I have been to many meditation, yoga, and self-improvement retreats. But I have never seen such a supportive retreat container as the School for The Work, nor have I ever seen such a well-run program. I loved waking up every day and having absolutely no idea what we were going to do next. I loved the feeling of being stretched to the very limits of my emotional capacity, all the while knowing that, if I needed it, I had a ton of support. I had some massive breakthroughs in my practice of Inquiry and my perspective on life. I went into the retreat feeling some pretty intense stress. I left feeling a sense of freedom, seeing that my mind was creating all sorts of drama that could be released through The Work. Thank you, Katie, for such an amazing experience.

The following blurb has been modified by BKI to better support the anonymity of the writer:

I have just finished the nine-day School and I cannot begin to put into words how life- changing this has been. I am in tears writing this, thinking about how much it will benefit the communities that we work with. I am already planning how we are going to incorporate the work into our daily youth programs and our youth mentor and staff programs throughout New Zealand and Latin America, at the orphanages where I work and with marginalized youth and communities in NZ.

We already use the work with our programs, but coming to the School I have seen just how powerful The Work can be and how much more I want to focus and share it with our beautiful people. I have so much more compassion for those who have harmed and continue to harm our children, which for me is saying something. I never thought I would have empathy towards someone who harmed one of our kids, but now I see it so differently and feel I can take action without hatred and be clearer and more loving in our vision moving forward and I hope it will have a ripple effect.

I cannot thank BKI enough for their support. It has really floored me. Your generosity will help me to support so many others. I can't believe how much I learned in just 9 days. You are all amazing, and I hope that Byron Katie and her staff and everyone who receives this message will know how grateful I truly am. I cannot wait to tell everyone to come to the School. Thank you for showing me that my natural state is happiness and for giving me so much inspiration to share The Work in the world with those who really need it.

I would love to thank BKI and the people who register without help, as this is what allows The Work Foundation & BKI, the two organizations that gave me the scholarship, to continue to support those like me who are without the necessary funds to attend. Please let me know if there is anything at all I can do to better support this amazing work.

With so much love,A.C.

I have done a lot of work on conflict resolution with young Serbians and Albanians in Kosovo and on conflict resolution in general, on resilience empowerment with teachers, parents, and vulnerable groups. Before I came to the School, I knew it was going to be a very valuable experience and that I would benefit from it, as would all the people I work with, but I had no idea…

Throughout the School, I had a living feeling that I was being invited into greatness. There were times when it was hard, when I felt I was wrestling with an invisible force that was causing me excruciating pain, but nevertheless, the feeling never left me—that I had come across something so valuable and so precious and that I had an opportunity to partake in the greatness of that which IS and of which I am a part.

What fascinated me during the School is how you have organized the program in such a holistic way—activities followed one another in a way that created a massive learning curve. I am aware that what you do in The Work is beyond educational paradigms, and I am not saying this from a position of an evaluator, but as a professional interested in how people learn, I was amazed at the way you fit the content—the hard-to-explain, what is beyond what we are used to—into a perfect methodology that follows all the rules that experts on holistic education talk about.

With endless gratitude,

Z, from Serbia

Before I did the School, I thought it was laziness that kept me from doing The Work; now I understand it was my ego’s way of holding me back from becoming a more fully realized me. Doing The Work with others in mindfulness gives me the discipline to go deeper. I found once I got used to writing out Worksheets and taking the time with a facilitation partner, it automatically became harder to tolerate any slight shitty feelings like doubt, resentment, etc. Sometimes the stories are obvious, like when anger wells up, but sometimes it can feel like an uneasiness or a slight misgiving about a person or situation. For me it can show up in a tight stomach, fatigue, listlessness, or I distract myself with social media and answering email. I may not notice that I am swimming upstream, but decision-making feels like heavy lifting. Ego likes this; it feels at home here.

The Work shows another way. If I slow down enough and sit mindfully with what is, I begin to notice cause and effect, and learn to track my inner movements. In this space with others, I take the time to focus on what it is I am thinking. The Work doesn’t get rid of thoughts, but it de-fangs them, makes them harmless. I love that.

W.J.

I’ve been to many workshops and retreats in my life, but I’ve never been to anything so masterfully designed, diverse, and profound as the adventure of this course. It is stunning and beyond belief. As a result, I am clearer, cleaner, and wiser at living my life. I find it virtually impossible to be a victim anymore, and my skill in facilitating The Work has become razor-sharp. I originally thought the course was expensive, and I see it now as priceless. This kind of love can’t be bought.

The School for The Work

Cost Details

The early-bird registration discount for first-time participants is $300. This discount expires Monday, 30 September 2019 at 11:59 p.m. PDT.

Repeat Participant:
$5,075 (tuition $2,623; accommodations $2,452)

Event Location

Ojai Valley Inn
905 Country Club Road
Ojai, CA 93023

Schedule

Below is a brief summary of the first and last day of the School, so that you can plan your arrival and departure accordingly. We ask that all participants attend the first and final sessions; they are essential to the course.